Mactan Island

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We had decided to do a tour of Mactan Island because our hotel offered it, and it would drop us at the airport, ready for our flight home. The staff at our hotel weren't the greatest, the first person we had inquired about the tour with told us he would speak to the manager and never got back to us. He obviously forgot about us, as when we went to reception to ask again, we asked a different member of staff, and when he saw us, he realised why we were there. The other member of staff said that they would ask the manager and then ring us. It's a good job, we weren't going anywhere that evening, as it took a few hours for them to ring us to confirm. It should have been a sign!

We left around ten in the morning. The front desk staff asked us if we had a plan of what we wanted to do, and we said no, we would just like to see and do the things listed in their tour programme. We left around 10 am. We had quite a big van for the two of us, so we were able to spread out. We drove for about an hour, possibly longer, we crossed from Cebu City to Mactan Island. Our first stop was a big church. We parked up in a backstreet, there were plenty of parking attendants about, to pay and keep an eye on the cars. The church was heaving, loads of people were there for mass. The church was called Virgen dela Regla. I wonder if it is the main church in the city, and that is why it is so busy, but I think all churches throughout the Philippines will be packed, the people are so devout. We took some photos of the outside of the church. There was a very emotive statue in the garden about abortion. We headed in to the church, the pews were packed. We went upstairs and joined some sort of procession, not being a Catholic or have ever been to church for a Sunday service, I didn't have a clue what was going on. Everybody washed their hands in a little font of water, and then walked passed a series of statues of Jesus. The statues were in glass cases, but there were holes cut out, so that people could touch and kiss the statues. Interesting, I had never seen people worship like this before.

I think Mactan Island is quite big, as we drove for quite a while to reach our next destination. I ended up falling asleep, but I think the traffic was quite bad, too, which is why it took so long. We parked up outside of Mactan Shrine. The shrine is free to enter, and there were quite a few hawkers about selling their wares. The shrine is set in a park, which is quite big. We wandered through the park to the water. This is where the Portuguese explorer, Ferdinand Magellan was defeated by Lapu-Lapu , the chieftain of Mactan Island. There is a huge statue of Lapu-Lapu, near the water's edge, and he looked very imposing. The waterway was quite pretty and there were a few kids playing about there. They looked like they were having fun. We took a walk through the park, it was really pretty and well maintained. Our guide told us a bit of history. I think I prefer to go to alone, rather than having guide, the information is interesting, but I feel like they are rushing you. It was very much okay, you've seen it, now we can go. I would have preferred to have been left alone to wander freely and take in the place a bit more.

We drove for a while and ended up at the airport, wtf? We had only been to two places and it was barely twelve o'clock. We were looking at each other, like what is going on, we haven't paid a fortune (by our standards) for a two hour tour. When we pulled up the driver/guide was like okay, here's the airport. We then had to tell him that our flight wasn't for hours and that we wanted to see and do other things on the island. We mentioned things that had been listed in the itinerary in the hotel's brochure and what time we would like to be at the airport and we set off again. The hotel staff definitely didn't communicate with each other, as we had told the front desk staff what time our flight was leaving, and roughly what time we needed to be at the airport. Obviously the sample itinerary in the hotel's brochure isn't shown to the staff.

We drove through Lapu-Lapu city and got to Alegre Guitars Factory. It was lunchtime and a Sunday, so staff were in thin supply. We had a look at the different parts of the guitars and different styles of guitars that were hung up on the wall. A guide/salesman came out and gave us a bit if a tour, explaining what went on there. We were in the outside workshop, what a beautiful place to work. There was another room or two further round, where the guitars are made pretty, but since it was a Sunday, the ladies who worked in that part of the factory had the day off. We had a look around the showroom, there were some beautiful pieces, all different kinds of guitars and ukuleles. It made me wish that I was musical and had a talent for playing an instrument. However, seeing as I am not, I ended up buying a small ornamental ukulele.

Our next port of call was a beach resort. It seems that on Mactan Island there are no public beaches, or even really any beaches. We had to pay an entrance fee, I think about 50 or 60 pesos, to enter Hadsan resort. Since it was the weekend, the resort was packed. There were a few picnic tables and benches that were filled with families enjoying themselves. There was also a sound system, which was pumping out the tunes. There was no beach to speak of, but there were some steps down to the water and there were a lot of people swimming. We took a wander to the restaurant, it didn't look very appealing. So we just took in the view, that water was gorgeous, so blue. We then took a wander around the resort, we were offered boat trips, it would have been nice to go on one if we had had more time. By this point we were starving, so we didn't spend too long at Hadsan.

We drove to another resort, and took a look at the menu, but it was a bit out of our budget, so our driver drove to the big shopping centre, which was near to the airport. We decided to eat at Mang Inasal, a fast food joint. Our diet has gone down hill, when we moved from Bohol to Cebu, from seafood to fast food. Mang Inasal means Mr. Barbecue. We ordered a selection of dishes to share. One of the selling points of Mang Inasal is for a small fee, you can have unlimited rice, however we decided we didn't need it. We got three dishes and there were all delicious. One was a sizzling hot plate of fish in some kind of sauce, another was noodles with pork and vegetables, and the last one was noodles with sauce, crushed nuts, shrimp and egg. All were served with lime to squeeze over, mmm I love lime, so all the dishes were well doused in it. Feeling full we headed to the airport, holiday almost over. We were hit by a surprise departure tax, which we didn't have any money to pay with, so we had to head to the domestic terminal and use the ATM.

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Comments

[Michele Garcia]

Mactan Island
Hey, would you mind if I ask what hotel that offered you those tours?

[Zephyr]

Mactan Island
It was Hotel Stella in Cebu City.